


Deserted to a Life of Trials

by Sukila



Series: Hello Charlotte Week (Sept. 22 - 28) [2]
Category: Hello Charlotte (Video Game), Hello Charlotte (Video Games)
Genre: #hellocharlotteweek, Backstory, Bittersweet Ending, Child Abuse, Child Neglect, Depression, Flashbacks, Hello Charlotte Week - Day 2, Home Alone Inspired Shenanigans, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Mentions of HC3, Terminal Illnesses, grave robbing, referenced human trafficking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-23
Updated: 2018-09-23
Packaged: 2019-07-11 20:23:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15979811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sukila/pseuds/Sukila
Summary: Charlotte remembered holding up little arms to her with hope, that just this once she might be granted an indulgent wish like that…She’d sneered at the hopeful face and brought it back down into despair, and the man beside her had been the one to kneel down and greet her eight year-old self. A pat on her head, a sidelong glance to the woman beside him, sly and carrying a hint of foul intent. He told her to go get something to show him, like her little bear from long ago, and when she ran back after grabbing it with an eager smile, the door slammed shut with a thundering sound.She couldn’t reach the latch, she’d never managed to, but in desperation she’d forgoed the long motion of pulling over a chair and jumped at it. Again and again, hearing the slightest thump of her balanced form coming back down to the floor. And when a tiny hand finally managed to bring it upwards just enough...when her weight against the wood and the turning of the knob managed to inch open the heavy door…Laughing. They were still there...laughing.





	Deserted to a Life of Trials

**Author's Note:**

> This isn't my best work, so I may edit it soon, but, as is, I'm fairly happy with how it turned out by the end :)

Living in a home without anyone had been hard. It was easy to forget things, easy to get lost in the corridors, even easier to just give up and wreck the place when she got frustrated. What wasn’t easy was survival, much less living, with food a constant shortage and the ever-present fear of leaving the house and encountering a problem with no hope for her.

 

There had been times where all she did was sit by the air vent and wait for the occasional distant echo of the elevator. Where she’d sit and try to survive without a reason, without an anchor, without any sort of purpose, failing miserably. Drinking from her mother’s foul bottles because the water was stale and the tap was spitting rust. Drunkenly marching about the house and trying to make something of each day, paper crafts, little trinkets, anything to keep shaky hands steady.

 

Her parents oldest clothes on a thin, now too-tall-for-little-girl-clothes body. A phone number just for show that had no hope of being used with the lacking availability of technology. No neighbors to speak of besides shut-ins who didn’t bother to care how loudly she screamed to cover up the silence.

 

Her mother had called them hyped-up druggies who would leave them alone in a thankful tone, like she was happy to have no one to come to her child’s rescue. Then again, maybe she’d never planned on leaving the day she practically leapt out the door and into the arms of another man, suitcase practically bulging with outfits and various sparkling stones. Charlotte remembered holding up little arms to her with hope, that just this once she might be granted an indulgent wish like that…

 

She’d sneered at the hopeful face and brought it back down into despair, and the man beside her had been the one to kneel down and greet her eight year-old self. A pat on her head, a sidelong glance to the woman beside him, sly and carrying a hint of foul intent. He told her to go get something to show him, like her little bear from long ago, and when she ran back after grabbing it with an eager smile, the door slammed shut with a thundering sound.

 

She couldn’t reach the latch, she’d never managed to, but in desperation she’d forgoed the long motion of pulling over a chair and jumped at it. Again and again, hearing the slightest thump of her balanced form coming back down to the floor. And when a tiny hand finally managed to bring it upwards just enough...when her weight against the wood and the turning of the knob managed to inch open the heavy door…

 

Laughing. They were still there...laughing.

 

“I told you, they’re quite the persistent little one,” the woman stated, almost triumphant, as though she’d won a bet.

 

“How much did you want for her?” Her heart seemed to drop into her stomach, their words growing distant and fuzzy as panic set in-

 

What were they talking about?!

 

“-Pick them up tonight, then-”

 

No. No, this wasn’t happening! A tiny form raced back inside, keeping quiet as she carried the chair slowly to keep it from scraping against the floor. Heart hammering as she redid the latch, hanging the chain across, and leaving the chair in front.

 

It wasn’t enough- They were going to take her if she didn’t!

 

They had box after box of duct tape, each emptied and strew across the floor as she ripped piece after piece to secure the fixture closed. Soap...she had a lot of that too… Something to stop the creaking of the floor as she crept across, and empty bottles of the liquid to hide little knick-knacks. Pepper spray in her mom’s old things, each one secured to her shaking form like a last defense.

 

Money- she had money now, she didn’t feel good about stealing it but...with only a few hours before nightfall and a fearful future… The vents could get her to the hallway, she’d need food, wouldn’t she?

 

It had been the longest night of her life, the banging on each window scaring her out of her wits. She was under her bed when they finally broke in, shaking and shuddering as the future darkened more and more as thunder clapped and lightning made shadow puppets on the walls.

 

Wet footsteps making their way in, the door practically hanging off its hinges, and several men dead before the remains as others ran in fear. She remembers when he held the knife to her throat with dead eyes until she stuttered out her okay. The soap she gathered was emptied out, bottles littering the bathroom floor as it was guzzled by the two who’d arrived.

 

Days later she’d snuck a glance back at their hiding space and received a job, it was the first time she wasn’t to go outside by herself, the first time she wasn’t afraid of what was behind her, only what was right there in front, leading them to the cemetery.

 

They taught her to wait for the monsters with gifts on winter holidays, gave her something to do between bouts of hapless insanity, and it gave her less of a reason to scream endlessly, afraid of being unwanted.

 

Because she was, by her mother, at least, but not by anyone else. And that trial was finally over.

 

But her life was nothing if not full of strife. That was a constant thought of an outlier watching a sick girl crumble, practically waiting for death.

 

It wasn’t an unfamiliar feeling, at least, not to a certain Felix Honikker’s memories.


End file.
